When it’s too cold to actually get out into nature, you can bring nature into your home to inspire your art. There are many nature DVDs available at your local public library. There are also a lot of art instruction resources (including DVDs, which I prefer over art books).
We all can use a little colour at the end of winter. It helps remind us of the colour to come. In March in southern Alberta, spring really is just around the corner.
When a chinook rolls in, get outdoors, get some sun, and bask in the warm feeling that the spring flowers will soon be blooming again. When the weather feels like March again (snow, snow, snow), stay in and paint pictures of the birds and spring flowers to come. The colour will help put a spring back in your step!
It has been very cold here for a week or so. I thought it was warmer this morning but, although it is -11C, it is -41C with the wind-chill. I’ve checked the forecast. It will be warming next week.
What will I be doing until then? The same thing I’ve been doing for the past week – learning how to paint water with watercolour paints. It isn’t as tough as I expected it would be. I’m enjoying this winter more than any winter in my life. Learning new watercolour techniques is a lot of fun.
Aside from painting, I’ve been feeding the birds outdoors, and writing poetry. There must be a Blue Jay watching my house from his. Whenever I put more peanuts out, I can hear him start calling his friends as soon as I’ve went inside. I love Blue Jays. I wrote a poem about them a few days ago. It follows (with videos between the stanzas).
When you’re out hiking, you’ll cross paths with these
while eating seeds in trees and having fun.
Their colours brighten up a winter’s day
like gifts that mother Nature gives to all.
We’re blessed because Pine Grosbeaks choose to stay
and don’t fly south, like Tanagers, in fall.
Between times spent outdoors this winter (while trying to spot some Pine Grosbeaks), you might want to stop by the Public Library to pick up a stack of movies to watch. The Public Library has more than enough entertainment to keep a person occupied on days that are too cold to venture outside (and, here in Lethbridge, we have a string of those days coming up). Anyone who still pays for television in Lethbridge (and other cities in Canada), are wasting money (that could be spent on bird seed).
I’m going to go shut myself away until the weather warms again. I will enjoy painting Watercolours while using Watercolour Secrets (a DVD course borrowed from the Public Library); watching movies and TV series’ (borrowed from the Public Library); writing poetry; and cooking great food (mostly cheap produce, spices, and food bought on clearance). Life can be great without spending hardly any money.
I’ll also be watching the outdoor birds while they eat plenty of seed from my window sill. I hope they make it through this cold snap. I love them all so much. If I could convince them to all take shelter in my house when it gets so cold outside, I would do so. It would be so messy, I know.
I really don’t get out much in the winter. I used to like cross country skiing – so much so that I own my own poles, boots, and skis. Cross country skiing isn’t so much fun in the city (unless you own a vehicle with snow tires to get to a nature reserve or some other beautiful natural area.
With a bad back, winter activities have become less attractive. This winter I’ve been doing watercolour paintings as a winter activity. Each day my back becomes sorer. I need some serious exercise.
I did manage to get out to Waterton the other day for a hike. I’ve been lucky that the weather has been nice, still. Once it gets colder, I’ll have to layer up. All the weight of the winter clothing isn’t fun for a bad back. On top of that, ice really makes outdoor activities frightening.
Who knows, though. We might get many clear and warm days yet to come in the months ahead. It was clear (though not so warm) this morning. The elms looked magical in the morning sun with the hoarfrost thickly coating each black bough. I’m glad I got out to see it.
Sometimes the thought of winter’s cold and ice keeps us in. Sometimes, if we get outdoors for a few moments, we realize that we can handle a little actual winter activity. Just getting out for a deck dinner sometimes helps me realize that the weather (and anticipated trail conditions) are hikable.
So, although I will still be painting in the mornings, I think I’ll try to get out in the afternoons.
I have included my poem Art Cocoon, below. It’s a sonnet. I haven’t included (video) spaces between the stanzas.
Art Cocoon
An artist needn’t much – a room will do.
I guess some ventilation would be nice –
a windowed room that has a lovely view
(that is if someone else will pay the price).
An artist craves fine food and luxury
so, when they’ve sold some art, they celebrate
(unless they’re artists much like me –
who think their room and food are great).
When I’m creating art, I rarely see
the other rooms beyond my studio.
My view becomes my painted scenery
and there’s no other place I’d rather know.
But when spring blooms, since days are brighter, then
I have included my poem, Oh Christmas Tree, at the end of this blog post with videos placed between the stanzas. Thank-you to everyone who was taken the time to read my blogs and watch my videos. Even when just a couple people do so, it really brightens my day.
Christmas is the only time of year that grocery stores offer nuts in the shell. Birds love nuts. Christmas is the only time humans bring a tree indoors to gather around. Birds love trees. What is the star attraction at the center of nearly all Christmas dinner tables? A bird. Christmas is a celebration of birds.
Sure, roasting and then eating a bird seems to be a funny way to celebrate birds, but it seems to me that birds are a very important part of every Christmas celebration, all the same. Honestly, it doesn’t even seem like Christmas without them.
I’d rather gift the birds with some nuts and seeds to stuff themselves with than stuff a dead bird and roast it. If you have a pet parrot, you can do both (hopefully not roasting the parrot – even though sometimes you might consider doing so).
I had a parrot and have been thinking of her lately. Christmas was always a great day for Max. Her favorite gifts were the nuts. We had to crack open the larger shells for her. She shelled her own almonds. I have included some songs that I wrote while thinking about Max.
I am thankful for all of the nuts that are available for people to buy for their loved ones (including their parrots). I am thankful for the birds that I get to feed while singing my songs in the park. I am also thankful that you have read this post. I am sending everyone of you my blessings. I hope you have an abundance of joy, love, health, comfort, and food this Christmas.
James and I plan on going to a senior center near home for Christmas dinner this year (and then we will feed the birds). It will be a lovely day. Having the birds visit us is more a gift for us than for the birds, as far as we see it. The birds always seem so thankful. They are certainly worth celebrating this Christmas.
Oh, Christmas Tree
Snow fell to bring some Christmas cheer
to all the plants still growing here –
the violets and the evergreens
that decorate the mountain scenes
that I’ve been painting while inside.
In wintertime, I tend to hide
indoors (away from winter’s cold)
with dogs I love to pet and hold,
but lately, I’ve been out instead
of spending so much time in bed.
It’s been so warm and calm each day
so I’ve been tempted out to stay
with wildlife that I love to see –
this life that truly nurtures me.
I think all humans feel this way.
It’s why, when we are forced to stay
indoors for Christmas, we can’t wait
to pull in trees to decorate.
But this year’s been so warm and clear
and living evergreens are near
and so I’ll go to them instead
of worshipping a tree that’s dead.
I mentioned Canada Geese in my song Shotgun for Christmas. If you would like to find out what I was talking about, check out the following internet sources:
Who hasn’t spent time in the mountains and left inspired to do art? I never thought I could pull off a mountain landscape this well. I’m thrilled. I have typed up my poem, The Cardston / Lethbridge Gift Exchange, and I’ve included it at the end of this post (with bird-feeding videos between the stanzas of the poem).
Learning new things when older can be humbling at times. It can be especially humbling to attempt to learn something that we consider to be child’s play (like art – since most adults haven’t done any painting since they were children). It is good for us to keep learning. It is good for us to keep playing, too.
It’s funny how many excuses we come up with to avoid doing things like learning how to paint watercolour mountains. Is it that we fear failing at “child’s play” and shaking our image of ourselves as knowing so much more than we did when we last painting pictures (as children)? Isn’t it better to be brave enough to let ourselves enjoy “child’s play” and learning to improve at something we actually enjoyed doing before we dumped fun for responsibility? Enjoying life helps us live. Living should be enjoyable.
Our number one excuse for not doing art is likely time. How much time do you spend in front of the tube? Our second excuse is likely expense. Luckily, doing art doesn’t have to be expensive. I was able to borrow a couple great art instruction courses from the public library. The Complete Essentials of Painting Mountains with Johannes Vloothuis came from the Cardston public library. I am very thankful that I was able to access Cardston’s resources to assist me in learning to do art this winter.
I have a lot of art supplies (from when I actually had an income to spend on such things). I figured I may as well use them or risk losing them (not all art supplies will last forever). I bought dollar store watercolour paints (which work about as well as you would expect them to, but I’m thankful for them).
I have been trying to learn how to paint mountains by going through art instruction DVDs. Lately I’ve mostly been working through The Complete Essentials of Painting Mountains with Johannes Vloothuis. You can see more of Johannes Vloothuis at wetcanvas.com or check out Artistnetwork.com (I haven’t done so yet).
The weather has been awesome. I keep hoping I’ll get to the mountains (and I’d go right past Cardston to get there). James will take me one of these days. Until then, I can spend my mornings with Johannes Vloothuis (well, his DVD) and paint pictures of mountains.
The Cardston / Lethbridge Gift Exchange
“It’s like an early Christmas gift,” you said
while on the road, with Cardston up ahead
and thinking back to all we’d seen that day –
the icy falls, and critters on the way
from Waterton to Cardston, on our trip.
There seemed to be a clear relationship
between abundant wildlife and the lack
of traffic present as we headed back
to Lethbridge, roughly three on Saturday.
It sure was peaceful driving on the way
to Cardston there, with no one else around,
but once in Cardston, peace could not be found.
The Carston crowd was heading home again
from Lethbridge Christmas shopping there just then.
Just judging by the traffic that we faced,
each Cardstonite had been here. What a waste.
They could’ve hit the mountains easily.
Though Waterton’s a gift to you and me,
to those folks there, it’s just a mountain view
they see each day. They all crave something new
to wrap in coloured paper that they buy,
to soon unwrap, then toss.
You know that I
won’t face the crowds to buy you something here.
You also know that, if the roads are clear,
no wrapped up treasure ever could compare
to Waterton, with you and I both there.
I wrote my poem and recorded the bird-feeding videos in late November. I borrowed the Art Instruction DVDs after that. I am sure that the Cardston crowd knows just how lucky they are to have Waterton on their doorstep (the painting mountains DVD did come from their library, after all). Kids want gifts under a tree at Christmastime. My poem was just a poem, that’s all.
I am truly thankful that the Cardston Public Library gave me the gift of that art instruction video to borrow just before Christmas this year. It was a great gift to share with me. If they want to drive to Lethbridge to find gifts for their loved ones, that’s great, too.
I have now written over 400 pages of Silas Stories (all told in rhyming verse). I have included a few in this post, including Elephant Day!; Sigh’s Sunburn; It Could’ve Been $2000, Though; Flint; and Maxy Matterhorn (most of which I read to the birds I feed in the park). I’ve also showed some of my recent watercolour paintings.
Flint
Sigh was in love with Jane Goodall. He said
so, but I didn’t worry at all.
In a way, I think I was quite flattered instead –
she was something like me (only tall).
Though Jane was beautiful, I couldn’t see
how she’d scored that position abroad.
Sigh’s attraction to someone unschooled worried me
only slightly (although it seemed odd).
I can imagine young Sigh as a chimp
in past lives somehow meeting young Jane –
perhaps one she would commonly tickle or primp.
Perhaps Sigh sought her tickles again.
Sigh, like Flo’s son, was a sensitive guy.
Perhaps Flo had been me and her son had been Sigh.
If you are interested in seeing what the pets from my Silas stories looked like, you might want to check out my watercolour painting posts (the previous two posts and those to follow). I am showing my paintings (their daily progress) at the beginning of each deck dinner (movie review) video for the next few months.
I plan on completing one hundred drawings or paintings this winter (all to illustrate my Silas Stories book that I’ve been working on). I am making good progress so far. I feel confident that I will achieve my goal, have fun, and learn a lot about painting with watercolour paints.
My dad thought the prairies were beautiful. He was surprised to hear that I didn’t find them beautiful. He loved the sky here. The skies are beautiful in the prairies.
If one is going to paint a prairie landscape, one must master sky painting. I have been reviewing an art instructional DVD by going through the lessons and actually doing the watercolour assignments. I have now finished the sky lessons. I will need a lot of practice if I’m going to pull off a descent prairie landscape painting, though.
Skies are challenging to paint. Perhaps even more so in the winter in the prairies because the water dries so fast of the page that the paint often doesn’t have the time to blend together. I am making progress, though. Some of my skies look alright.
I am happiest with my night sky painting. I pulled off the night sky well and had a lot of practice painting fluffy clouds on the “wall of my bedroom” in the painting. In reality, the cloud wallpaper in my room was shades of cream and a brown smoggy colour (which was why it was on sale at Zellers and why I was allowed to pick it out, so I was thankful for the colour of it). I gave my bedroom painting a happier, orange colour scheme. Artistic license and all that.
Anyhow, if you watch my (mostly failed) attempts at painting skies in my videos, it may inspire you to follow this or another art instructional DVD. Sometimes it is disheartening to see the artist’s finished project. You end up comparing your attempt with theirs. Of course theirs is better. You wouldn’t want to learn from someone who didn’t know what they were doing well.
Don’t expect that your art will look as good as theirs right away. That artist got a lot of practice before he (or she) was ready to start teaching. You will need a lot of practice as well.
I don’t even know if my mom would want to hang some of the paintings that I’ve been doing lately on her fridge. That’s alright. I’m still happy with my paintings. Every one is a success since I am learning with each attempt.
Learning is humbling. It takes courage to learn as an adult (which is why so few people do it). Be brave. Be a life long learner!
I sing my song, I’m a child, in an attached video on this blog post. I also talk about the art projects that I’ve been working on. I call it Ditch Art and encourage others to try it out. I explain some ditch art techniques in the video after my song performance. I have gone into more detail explaining techniques in a previous video that I made on the subject in the fall of 2020.
I have also included my poem, Two Nights of Rain, at the end of this post (with videos between the stanzas). I was sure we’d get a killing frost tonight but it looks like the garden may get to keep green and growing for a little while longer. It might not frost tonight, but it will be a gamble to not pull in the harvest, though. I wrote Two Nights of Rain on September 29, 2023.
Ditch Art makes weeding the garden a lot more fun. If you do not have a garden to weed, you can find ample art supplies in ditches that you drive past on your way to hiking spots. You can also make ditch art with freshly fallen leaves (that aren’t dried out yet). You can even make ditch art from garden leaves that will hit the compost pile eventually.
When we harvest the garden, tomato leaves and other plant matter just go to waste. Why not pull out the watercolor paints before you pitch the greens into the compost? NOTE: If you use spray paint for your “ditch art,” the greens will not be compostable after the art project.
I have a friend who regularly digs up and relocates weeds and native plants that she comes across in gas station parking lots or other lots that will end up controlling their weeds chemically. She later eats parts of these weeds. I have never thought that this was a wise thing that she does. Somehow she hasn’t died yet.
You don’t know what kind of chemicals you are exposing yourself to when foraging in this manner. When it comes to Ditch Art, your exposure is minimal. However, you may consider wearing dish washing gloves or latex gloves when painting in this fashion. I wear gloves. It saves being covered with acrylic paints (which can also be very toxic).
If you choose to use spray paint when creating Ditch Art, you will need to wear a ventilator mask. You likely have many masks kicking around your home these days. Spray paint is toxic, as is indicated on each can of paint with the skull and cross bones symbol. No one should have to suffer physically for their art. Art should be fun and safe.
I just used acrylics (on the leaves to stick them to the paper), and watercolor paint (poured from jars onto the leaves and paper), and a spray bottle full of water to make this art. It cost little (I used paint from the dollar store). The paper cost a bit, though – that came from Michael’s craft store.
Two Nights of Rain
It’s tough to let the flower garden go
and let the fall, then winter, settle in.
I’ve brought plants in to crowd my windows, so
I’ve kept reminders of how things have been
outside (where I’ve been dining every day
these past few months amongst the flowers there.
A couple nights of rain will come our way.
The rain is great – the garden needs the care.
The cloudy skies will keep the frost at bay,
but days will stay quite cool without the sun.
The sky will clear the way for frost some day
quite soon – once these two nights of rain are done.
mountainbrideblog 